FilmLab Release Notes

FilmLab Desktop 3.3

FilmLab 3.3 makes digitizing your film faster and more enjoyable than ever before, with brand new automatic features and an upgraded crop tool.
Video preview

Auto crop, auto rotate (and improved auto color balance an exposure)

  • Auto crop. FilmLab will analyze your film scan, find the film frame in the center, and set the crop to match the frame borders. And it will detect if the frame matches a common aspect ratio, and if so adjust the crop to be exactly that aspect ratio
  • Auto rotate. FilmLab will analyze the contents of each image and rotate it to have the correct side up. Great for rolls that have a mix of portrait and landscape shots!
  • Better auto exposure and color balance.
These new features work together to let you quickly go from a directory of film scans to a set of good-looking images. Of course, you retain full control over your photos, and can still manually adjust the crop, exposure, and color balance to dial in each image to match your creative vision.

Crop tool improvements

  • Fixed aspect ratio crops: You can now select from most common aspect ratios when cropping.
  • The crop area show shows a 3x3 grid, and when rotating a grid is overlaid on the entire image to help with visual alignment
The new overlay grid in the crop tool makes it easier to straighten your images
The new overlay grid in the crop tool makes it easier to straighten your images

FilmLab Desktop 3.4 beta 1

Right on the heels of the FilmLab 3.3 release, we have the first beta of the upcoming FilmLab 3.4!

New Features

  • Faster exporting using a new custom raw demosaicing implementation that runs on the GPU. Depending on your hardware, exporting may now be up to 6x faster. (If you run into any artifacts in your exported images please let us know. The new code is tested and working but it’s possible that there will be issues with some combinations of graphics cards and raw files.)

Bug Fixes

  • Fixed a bug where when editing an image corner position in corner-adjustment mode, the rest of the image would temporarily disappear
 

FilmLab Desktop 3.2.1

FilmLab 3.2.1 is a bug fix release with the following improvements:
  • Fixed a bug that could cause a crash with the message “Cannot read properties of undefined”
  • Fixed a bug that could cause the image editor to fail to load an image. This happened most often when starting FilmLab and attempting to load the image that was being edited in the previous session
 

FilmLab Desktop 3.3 beta 1

FilmLab 3.3 beta 1 introduces new automatic features that make converting your film scans faster and more enjoyable than ever!

New Features

  • Auto crop (in batch mode and in the crop tool)
  • Auto orientation/rotation
  • New, more accurate auto exposure and auto color balance
  • New “Process” button in the folder view toolbar. It looks like a little piece of film and can be used to easily batch process the currently selected set of film scans.
These auto features are truly beta status. They work pretty well, most of the time, but they aren’t fully polished yet. Expect the user interface, speed, and overall accuracy to improve before these features get officially released.
This build also includes the bug fixes from FilmLab 3.2.1.

FilmLab Desktop 3.2

FilmLab Desktop 3.2 is now out of beta and available as a stable release! (See previous release notes for a list of new feature and bug fixes.)

Additional Bug Fixes (from 3.2 beta 2)

  • Fixed an issue where long directory paths would push the “Choose…” button off the side of the export dialog, making it hard to choose a new export path
  • Fixed an issue where the “Show in [File Manager]” appeared twice in the right click menu for an image

FilmLab Desktop 3.2 beta 2

The next beta release of FilmLab 3.2 is out! This release makes it easier to go back and forth between FilmLab and your system file manager, and fixes bugs.

New Features

  • New “Show in File Manager” (or “Show in Finder” or “Show in File Explorer”, depending on your platform) option in the Image menu and right click menus
  • Filenames and folder names in the top bar can now be clicked to open them in your system file manager
  • The folder name in the Export dialog can now by clicked to open in your system file manager

Bug Fixes

  • Fixed a bug where thumbnails wouldn’t show up correctly if the folder path contained an ampersand (”&”) character
  • Folder path in top bar now expands to use all available room instead of being cut off
  • Fixed a bug where the sharpening slider in Settings > Defaults had a maximum value of 1 instead of 2

FilmLab Desktop 3.2 beta 1

We’re happy to release the first beta of FilmLab 3.2. This is a bug fix release that fixed up some image processing issues that have been reported by customers. Full details below, but first let’s look at some pictures!
A FilmLab 1 film scan. It looks good at normal viewing sizes, but there are some artifacts at the pixel level.
A FilmLab 1 film scan. It looks good at normal viewing sizes, but there are some artifacts at the pixel level.
Zoomed in view of pixel artifacts in FilmLab 3.1. Top circle shows a seam where two areas of the image are offset by one pixel. Bottom circle shows spots in highlights.
Zoomed in view of pixel artifacts in FilmLab 3.1. Top circle shows a seam where two areas of the image are offset by one pixel. Bottom circle shows spots in highlights.
In FilmLab 3.2 beta 1, these issues are corrected. The image also has less digital noise to due to improved raw handling and sharpening algorithms.
In FilmLab 3.2 beta 1, these issues are corrected. The image also has less digital noise to due to improved raw handling and sharpening algorithms.
Full list of bug fixes and improvements:
  • Fixes issues with raw processing and sharpening that could result in solid color pixels (usually magenta/pink in color) showing up in bright areas when converting color negatives
  • Fixes an issue where seams could sometimes be seen between areas of an image at the pixel level when an image had rotation applied
  • Improves the sharpening algorithm. The new algorithm avoids introducing color artifacts when sharpening, and allows for a greater range of usable sharpening values
  • Fixes an issue where TIFF and Jpeg XL files wouldn’t be exported properly on Windows systems if the target path contained UTF-8 (non-ascii) characters
  • Updates raw processing engine to add support for OM System 14-bit high resolution files, Nikon PixelShift merged files, Canon EOS R5 C, Leica SL4, Nikon Zf (non-HEIF raw files only), Pentax KF, Sony A9iii, and other cameras
  • Registers FilmLab to open OM system .ori raw files
  • Fixes an issue where TIFFs were saved as 16-bit even when the 8-bit option was selected
 

FilmLab Desktop 3.1

After a series of beta releases, the stable release of FilmLab Desktop 3.1 is now available! See the blog post, which includes a video walking through the major new features introduced since FilmLab 3.0.
Compared to the last FilmLab 3.1 beta, this release adds the following new features:
  • Kodak UltraMax 400 (400 GC) film profile
  • Fixes some potential bugs related to login and subscription state synching.
 

FilmLab Desktop 3.1 beta 2

Our first beta release of the year is a big one, with some features that users have been eagerly waiting for. If you’re a FilmLab user, please try this beta build and let us know what you think!

New Features

  • Export in more color spaces: Adobe RGB, ProPhoto RGB, Display P3
  • Added ability to choose film stock and backlight when batch-editing color negative images
  • Your last used film stock and backlight will now be remembered, and will be applied by default when editing a new color negative image
  • Added JPEG XL as an export format. JPEG XL is a great format for film images as it supports 16-bit depth to capture subtle color details, with lossy compression for much small file sizes compared to TIFF
  • When exporting as JPEG, you can now adjust the quality
  • File names can now be shown in the folder view. This can be turned on and off with the menu item View -> Show Filenames in Folder View
  • Color sliders can now be adjusted in smaller increments for fine-tuned color balancing
  • A new “Defaults” pane in Settings allows you to set default adjustments for sharpening and denoising

Bug Fixes

  • Fixed a bug where thumbnails wouldn’t load properly when access network paths on Windows
  • Fixed a bug where thumbnails wouldn’t load properly when accessing folders with names containing non-ascii characters on Windows
  • Fixed a bug where certain raw images captured in a vertical orientation would be flipped by default
  • Fixed a rendering issue where black pixels in dark areas of a scan would up as bright noise in the processed image
  • Fixed an issue where scanning flare correction wasn’t being applied correctly to color negative images

Known Issues

  • The Linux versions are compiled against glibc 2.36, which is only present on fairly recent Linux distributions. We’re working on getting set up to build on an older Linux machine to improve our backward compatibility.
  • On Ubuntu and other systems, you may get the error “the SUID sandbox helper binary was found, but is not configured correctly.” To work around this, launch the FilmLab appImage with the flag --no-sandbox.

FilmLab Desktop 3.1 beta 0

New features

  • Linux support! 🐧 FilmLab now is available for Linux (see the new downloads page). For now, FilmLab is available as an AppImage for x64 systems. We’re planning go expand to arm64, and possibly other distributable formats, in the future.
  • Windows on Arm support. FilmLab Desktop for Windows now includes arm64 binaries, for optimum performance on Snapdragon X chips, Copilot+ PCs, and other Arm-based laptops and desktops.
  • New settings window (FilmLab → Settings on Mac, File → Settings on Windows and Linux). This replaces the Account window and also includes the app update and graphics renderer information that used to be in the About window.
  • The Graphics tab of the new Settings window now allows you to see all available graphics renderers that FilmLab supports on your system, and switch between them. This allows users who are having trouble with their graphics card to try a different card or different graphics rendering layer.
  • Auto update can now be turned off in Settings.
  • Adds support for raw DNG files with Jpeg-XL encoding (such as files produced by the iPhone 16 Pro).

Bug fixes

  • Fixed bug where denoising/sharpening wasn’t being properly applied.
  • Fixed crash when loading large images. Note that currently the live view doesn’t show full resolution on large images when zooming in to pixel peep. This will be fixed in an upcoming release.
  • Fixed a crash in cases when an image file was missing or didn’t load properly.
  • Finally fixed an issue on Windows where FilmLab wouldn’t shut down properly when the “Install and Restart” button was pressed to install an update, which would then block the install from completing. (Unfortunately this issue is still present in the 3.0.0 stable release, so when upgrading from FilmLab 3.0.0 you may need to use Task Manager to end the previous FilmLab process.)

FilmLab Desktop 3.0

It’s official, FilmLab 3 is out!

Major new features (since FilmLab 2.5)

  • New image processing system takes advantage of modern graphics processors for more speed
  • New color negative process gives much more accurate results
  • New black and white process gives more accurate results and has better contrast control
  • Highlight and shadow recovery tools for color and black and white
  • Sharpening and denoising tools

New features from beta 10

  • Add details of current graphics renderer to About screen
  • Trial mode changed: A subscriptions now include a two week free trial, instead of the free trial being limited to 36 images

Bug fixes from beta 10

  • When on a laptop with an integrated GPU and dedicated GPU, prefer the dedicated GPU
  • Fix crash when quickly navigating back and forth between folder view and editor view
 

FilmLab Desktop 3.0 beta 10

New Features

  • Added Kodak Vision3 250D film profile

Bug fixes

  • Fixed an issue with banding when exporting images with falloff correction applied
 

FilmLab Desktop 3.0 beta 9

New Features

  • Added more film stock profiles (including Kodak Portra 800, Kodak Pro Image 100, Fuji Pro 400H, and more)
  • Added more light source profiles to support the Skier Sunray copy box, CineStill CS-LITE, and VALOI easy35
  • Restored ability to choose a photo of your backlight to use for falloff compensation

Bug fixes

  • Fixed crashing bugs
  • Updated graphics backend to improve compatibility with older video cards and lay the groundwork for new features

System requirements and compatibility

As of this build, FilmLab is officially supported on Windows 10 and 11 or MacOS 10.14 “Mojave” and newer. Depending on your system, you may find that FilmLab works for you on Windows 8.1, but this is not officially supported and you will likely run into problems.
Note that this release drops support for macOS 10.1 High Sierra.

Known issues

  • Support for very large images is still in progress and not included in this release.
  • Depending on your graphics card, you may find that batch operations run slower in this build. This is a known issue and we have a fix planned.
 
 
 

FilmLab Desktop 3.0 beta 8

  • Adds support for opening PNG images

FilmLab Desktop 3.0 beta 7

  • Fixes a bug where FilmLab on Windows would crash when attempting to export files in TIFF format
 

FilmLab Desktop 3.0 beta 6

  • Fixed a bug where FilmLab would crash on startup on Macs running MacOS 12 (Montery) and older. If you ran into this bug on a previous beta release, it may prevent auto-update from working. If so, you’ll need to download the latest beta directly from our website.
  • Fixed a crash when batch processing files
  • Fixed an issue with visual artifacts showing up in output files when using the “Standard” camera profile
  • Extended the range of the density slider
Demo Video
Video preview

FilmLab Desktop 3.0 beta 5

New Features and Improvements
  • Selectable film profiles for Color Negative process
  • Improved color conversion for Color Negative process
  • Shadow and highlight controls for both Color Negative and Black and White Negative processes
  • More usable slider ranges for Color Negative and Black and White Negative processes
Bug fixes
  • Fixes an issue where exported images would come out black on some computers
  • Fixes a related issue where FilmLab sometimes became unstable after exporting
  • Fixes several other potential crashing issues
    For full details and sample images, see the blog post.
     

    FilmLab Desktop 3.0 beta 4

    • Fixes a bug where image aspect ratio would be wrong after resizing a window with the editor open
    • Fixes a bug that caused a crash
    • Fixes a bug where a FilmLab process would continue running in the background after closing the app in Windows
     
     

    FilmLab Desktop 3.0 beta 2

    • Fixes a bug where the wrong camera sensor profile was sometimes being used by default
    • Improves auto exposure and auto color algorithms

    FilmLab Desktop 3.0 beta 1

    FilmLab 3 is a big leap forward in color science and speed. For full details on FilmLab 3 and what’s included in the first beta release, see the announcement.